White Paper
August 1, 2026
Journal Article
August 13, 2026
Healthy democracies and healthy economies go together.
The Berkeley Economy & Society Initiative advances ideas that foster robust democracy and shared prosperity. Our research addresses the root cause of policy failures: struggling political and economic institutions.
The latest at BESI
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Journal ArticleAugust 13, 2026
Strategic objectives underpin national climate pledges
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BlogSeptember 24, 2026
Project Syndicate: ‘AI firms’ self-serving warnings’
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In the NewsSeptember 23, 2026
Perfil: ‘”Financialization was not a consequence of neoliberalism, but rather the apparatus that installed it,” says Brian Judge’
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In the NewsAugust 18, 2026
USA Today: ‘Becerra reveals “power hour” idea to give California free electricity’
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In the NewsAugust 18, 2026
Capitol Weekly: ‘California should stop funding its progressive values on the backs of the poor’
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In the NewsAugust 13, 2026
Project Syndicate: ‘The AI threat to financial stability’
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Event RecapJuly 6, 2026
Suburban blues: The clash of local and national politics in America’s suburbs
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BlogJuly 1, 2026
Summer workshop on political economy of finance brings together emerging scholars from around the globe
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Event RecapJune 2, 2026
Muskism: A guide for the perplexed
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In the NewsMay 14, 2026
Project Syndicate: ‘Europe needs the digital euro’
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In the NewsMarch 30, 2026
New Zealand Herald: ‘Major Wall Street figures have begun sounding alarms about private credit’
Ideas for shared prosperity
We generate, support, and disseminate research that addresses major threats to shared prosperity and explores opportunities to build a more robust and inclusive political economy.
Advancing the interdisciplinary study of political economy
BESI funds emerging scholars at the doctoral level.
We’re proud to support the Designated Emphasis (DE) in Political Economy at UC Berkeley. DE students participate in vital discussions outside their home disciplines, enhancing dialogues and enabling research at the cutting edge of scholarship.
Research spotlight
Public institutions for cleantech commercialization in the United States
In an article for the journal Nature Communications, BESI Climate lead Jonas Meckling and UC Berkeley Environmental Science, Policy, and Management Ph.D. candidate Em Finkelstine introduce a dataset of 122 institutions that promote cleantech commercialization.
Strategic objectives underpin national climate pledges
A journal article for Nature Communications by UC Berkeley Energy and Resources Ph.D. student Taryn Fransen and BESI Climate lead Jonas Meckling provides an empirical account of the strategic objectives of emissions reduction pledges via interviews with 40 policymakers. They find that the main purpose of emissions reduction pledges is to influence international actors, not enact domestic preferences.
Coalition cascades: The politics of tipping points in clean energy transitions
In this journal article, which received the American Political Science Association’s Theodore J. Lowi Award, BESI Climate lead Jonas Meckling and his coauthor Nicholas Goedeking, researcher at the German Institute of Development and Sustainability, advance a model of the politics of tipping points based on trans-subsystem policy feedback that results in “coalition cascades.”
Making California more affordable: A policy roadmap
California suffers from an affordability crisis. Our white paper series explores the drivers of unaffordability in California and presents policy reforms to make the state more affordable. Policy failures are generally rooted in political failures, so we also propose upstream political and governance reforms to help affordability-enhancing measures take hold and endure.
Public institutions for cleantech commercialization in the United States
In an article for the journal Nature Communications, BESI Climate lead Jonas Meckling and UC Berkeley Environmental Science, Policy, and Management Ph.D. candidate Em Finkelstine introduce a dataset of 122 institutions that promote cleantech commercialization.
Strategic objectives underpin national climate pledges
A journal article for Nature Communications by UC Berkeley Energy and Resources Ph.D. student Taryn Fransen and BESI Climate lead Jonas Meckling provides an empirical account of the strategic objectives of emissions reduction pledges via interviews with 40 policymakers. They find that the main purpose of emissions reduction pledges is to influence international actors, not enact domestic preferences.
Coalition cascades: The politics of tipping points in clean energy transitions
In this journal article, which received the American Political Science Association’s Theodore J. Lowi Award, BESI Climate lead Jonas Meckling and his coauthor Nicholas Goedeking, researcher at the German Institute of Development and Sustainability, advance a model of the politics of tipping points based on trans-subsystem policy feedback that results in “coalition cascades.”
Subterranean archives
Historians Robyn d’Avignon (NYU) and Matthew Shutzer (UC Berkeley) coordinated the Forum section for a volume of the journal Environmental History, in which novel archival sources and approaches take center stage. Situated in case studies in Africa, the Middle East, the Pacific, and the United States, the essays call attention to how underutilized archival knowledge has begun to reframe environmental historians’ approach to subterranean histories.
How the economic and political geography of the United States fuels right-wing populism — and what the Democratic Party can do about it
In this essay for the Washington Center for Equitable Growth, BESI director Paul Pierson and his frequent collaborator, Yale political scientist Jacob Hacker, describe the shifting coalitional bases of America’s two major parties and how relate to the political-economic geography of the U.S.
The predistribution solution
Former Roosevelt Institute senior research Sunny Malhotra and BESI Capitalism and Democracy affiliate Steve Vogel and analyze the American political economy past and present through the lens of predistribution.
Fairness according to whom? Divergent perceptions of fairness among white and Black Americans and its effect on trade attitudes
BESI Climate affiliated faculty member Ryan Brutger and Designated Emphasis in Political Economy student Daniel Lobo co-authored this article for the American Political Science Review, which reviews their survey of white and Black Americans on their attitudes toward trade.
Toward an interdisciplinary political economy of wages
In a November 2025 article for the journal Politics & Society, UC Berkeley Political Economy director and BESI steering committee member Steve Vogel argues that that economists should bring power into the heart of their analysis of wage formation.
Aspirational service delivery: A theory of bureaucratic governance under digitization in India
Background and the shared puzzle India’s digital governance reforms are more centralized and ambitious than most other reforms. A single biometric identifier underwrites welfare delivery for hundreds of millions of citizens. CCTNS standardizes police record-keeping across thousands of stations. State-level dashboards visualize district performance in near real time. The stated…
Revisiting network neutrality for the enhanced internet
This project revisits the net neutrality debate in light of contemporary technological realities. Distributed caching infrastructure is no longer incidental; it is functionally necessary for high-performance internet service. The authors propose democratizing caching by requiring that first-hop ISPs offer standardized caching services as a component of baseline broadband access.
Visual stimulation in digital content
An increasingly important and overlooked dimension of digital content quality for kids is the level of visual stimulation. This project uses computer vision to quantify these overstimulating visual features that are linked to adverse cognitive and behavioral outcomes.
The development and adoption of religious AI: The technological restructuring of American religion?
This project looks at how AI is being developed and adopted within religious organizations. This is a project that spans disciplinary boundaries, bringing digital sociology and the sociology of culture into conversation with theology and religious studies.
Making California more affordable: A policy roadmap
California suffers from an affordability crisis. Our white paper series explores the drivers of unaffordability in California and presents policy reforms to make the state more affordable. Policy failures are generally rooted in political failures, so we also propose upstream political and governance reforms to help affordability-enhancing measures take hold and endure.
To make California more affordable, improve the effectiveness and efficiency of social spending
California, with its progressive tax system and dynamic economy, has some of the highest levels of per-capita government spending in the country. But state programs systematically suffer from fragmentation and complexity. Part 4 of our white paper series argues that, to make the state more affordable, we need to streamline and simplify public programs to more effectively help residents cope with high costs.
To make California more affordable, reform regressive regulations
To address its unaffordability problem, California must reform regressive regulations. Time and time again the state has pursued progressive goals through policies that raise the cost of essentials — hitting low-income residents hardest. This regressively funded progressivism is a major driver of California’s high cost of living. Part 3 of our white paper series explores how these costly and often ineffective regulations work and offers a path toward durable reform.
To make California more affordable, government must foster sustainable growth
The primary driver of California’s unaffordability and poverty is our high cost of living. And the foremost driver of high costs in California is a policy regime that makes it difficult to build the physical infrastructure we need to deliver essentials, particularly housing. Part 2 of our white paper series on making California more affordable explains the origins of growth restrictions in California, explores the implications of those restrictions, analyzes the politics of pro-growth policies, and offers a path forward to achieve sustainable growth.
Democracy in default
Berkeley Program on Finance and Democracy’s research director offers a new perspective on the birth of neoliberalism, showing that — counter to the prevailing narrative — financialization was not the offspring of deregulation but the mechanism that allowed neoliberalism to take root.
When code isn’t law: Rethinking regulation for artificial intelligence
In this article for the journal Policy and Society, BESI Technology Network affiliate Brian Judge and his co-authors at the Center for Human-Compatible AI examine the challenges of regulating AI and propose an adapted model of regulation suitable for AI’s novel features.
Support our work.
Our work depends on philanthropic support and the generosity of donors. If you find our work valuable, please consider making a gift so our researchers can help build a political economy that works for everyone.
